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IBM hosted its annual flagship live event, Think 2023, from May 9 to May 11 at the Universal Loews Resort in Orlando, Florida, with a slightly different format and purpose than pre-Covid Think events.  Rather than host a single massive IBM event to bring together customers and Business Partners from all over the world, Think 2023 is designed to travel. This year, following the May event, Think sessions geared to senior business and technology leaders from across many industries will hit the road for Think On Tour, taking the experience to 11 cities around the world from June to October.

What’s more, IBM has created a new Global Event for developers, architects, and users of IBM software, called IBM TechXchange, which takes at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas September 11-15. TechXchange 2023 will offer technical deep dives, Hands-on Labs, Customer stories, and Best Practice sessions by practitioners for practitioners. Want to submit a session idea for IBM TechXchange?  Go here. 

IBM’s event strategy in 2023 is to bring its vision and expertise in Hybrid Cloud and Artificial Intelligence to Business and IT leaders locally while also offering practitioners their own event with deep technical content geared to help users get more value out of their company’s investment with IBM. 

            IBM CEO Arvind Krishna on the Think main stage introducing Watsonx

Understanding clients of all types and sizes are interested in Automation, Automation, and AI were a primary focus at Think last week.  In case you missed it or want to hear more Automation news from Think 2023, here are some highlights: 

• IBM CEO Arvind Krishna introduced IBM Watsonx, our enterprise-ready AI and data platform to train, tune, validate, and deploy AI. IBM Watson Orchestrate, Watson Assistant, and IBM AIOps Insights use the watsonx.ai foundation models. Arvind also featured a demo of the upcoming IBM Watson Code Assistant in his opening keynote 
• Parul Mishra presented IBM's view of Digital Labor and demoed Watson Orchestrate Enterprise Edition during Rob Thomas' AI and Automation keynote. If you have been following the evolution of Watson Orchestrate on the Community, you’ll see how companies have started using it to differentiate themselves.
• In the Think Forum showcase, a new Instana and Turbonomic experience sparked great conversations and interest in the many Automation product demos throughout the event. 
• IBM Automation debuted several new products: Watson Orchestrate Enterprise Edition, IBM AIOps Insights, IBM Event Automation, Hybrid Cloud Mesh, and IBM Instana Observability Business Monitoring.

What was evident from the client panel discussions and many overheard conversations among client attendees is that Automation has become a key priority. Many agree that we are at the beginning of the "AI for Business" era, where enterprises are rapidly experimenting with new ways to embed AI into the fabric of their business.

Many of the keynote sessions were broadcast live and are now available as recordings. Click here to watch. You’ll see not only IBM executives in action but compelling demonstrations and customer stories that will inspire.

Also, check out where Think on Tour is headed this summer and which one is closest to your location. If you attended Think or viewed some of the broadcasts or recordings, we’d love to hear your thoughts in the comment section below.